How do credits work?

**Update**: I got a refund. It was a bit of back and forth with them not understanding the situation, but eventually they did. They were surprisingly responsive and the refund was decided about 24 hours after first contact.

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I thought buying credits would allow me to keep working past the rate limit. That's exactly what Codex says here: "To continue using Codex, add credits or upgrade to Pro today" (I'm on Plus). The documentation [says](https://developers.openai.com/codex/pricing#:~:text=Credits%20let%20you%20continue%20using%20Codex%20after%20you%20reach%20your%20included%20usage%20limits.) "Credits let you continue using Codex after you reach your included usage limits."

I bought credits. The limits haven't changed and I'm still blocked. I can't use Codex. What am I missing?

Worse yet, after I saw this I thought I needed to restart Codex for the credits to take effect, but that didn't work. When I looked at the usage page, instead of 1000 credits I had 998. Ok, I thought, maybe Codex uses 2 credits to start up? Then I started chatting with ChatGPT (web) about this, then I looked again and it's now at 995. I haven't touched Codex. What the fuck!?